It was a hell of a long walk back. Bucky had known they were behind enemy lines—who builds a weapons factory on the other guys' side of the fence?—but he hadn't known how far exactly. He was glad he hadn't asked either. If he'd known it was thirty miles from the get-go, he might have had some trouble talking himself into making it that far. Actually, he was making it a lot farther than he would have thought. The adrenaline rush from the escape had lessened, but it was more like it had moved to a low boil instead of fizzling out altogether. He supposed that was a good thing, but it was kind of weird.
He didn't have too much time to think about it. Between keeping an eye on the men, keeping an eye and an ear out for enemy soldiers, and keeping an eye on Steve, he didn't have the brain power to devote to much else.
By the time they crossed back into friendly territory, even Steve was starting to drag. Bucky wondered how much food it took to keep him going now—Little Steve ate like a bird, but surely that wouldn't fly now that he was this size. Not that any of them had eaten since their escape, but he was only capable of worrying about so many things at once, and Steve was a lot of them.
He kept a closer eye on Steve, but though he was moving slower, he never faltered. He also kept a closer eye on the rest of the men as he made his way up and down the convoy. The wounded were staying put in the vehicles, and several of the men who weren't were taking rotations and riding where there was room. By midmorning, Bucky was seriously considering joining them. That freakish adrenaline was finally wearing off, and putting one foot in front of the other was taking more and more work. It was taking him longer to get back to the front of the convoy when he drifted back to do his checks—although some of the delay probably had to do with the fact that he had to keep drifting off into the bushes to throw up.
His head was starting to spin again, and he was just about to tell Steve that he was going to need some help staying upright when men in familiar, friendly, good old American uniforms started appearing on the side of the road. They were here! Whispers and pointing turned into cheers and whistles, and Bucky squared his shoulders back. He'd made it this far. He would make the last steps on his own two feet.
Cheers and smiling faces surrounded them as the barrier across the road was raised, and though most were strangers, Bucky recognized some faces from the 107th. Steve turned to smile at him as they passed into the camp, clapping a hand to Bucky's shoulder. Considering that he was the guy that had just rescued them all, he seemed awfully surprised it had worked. Bucky smiled back—not as big as he would have liked, but staying on his feet really was taking most of his concentration—and nodded. He was proud of Steve. He was proud of all of them.
They came to a stop in front of a man who was obviously in charge and was followed closely by a woman in uniform who, Bucky noted, only seemed to have eyes for Steve. Steve obviously knew them both, walking right up to them and saluting. "Some of these men need medical attention," he said. The other man—a Colonel, by the look of it—eyed the crowd around them and looked back at Steve with a calculating expression. Steve took a deep breath. "I'd like to surrender myself for disciplinary action," he added.
Bucky sighed inwardly. If they hadn't been standing in front of a Colonel, Bucky would have used what little strength he had left to whack Steve across the back of the head. Disciplinary action. Of course Steve had gone on an unsanctioned rescue mission. Idiot. Bucky didn't know why he was surprised.
The Colonel looked around and shook his head a little. "That won't be necessary," he said with a smile that didn't look like it got used that often.
"Thank you, Sir," Steve replied. Bucky wasn't sure who this Colonel was yet, but apparently he didn't give out approval much. Steve was practically glowing.
The Colonel left and the woman stepped forward, looking Steve up and down. She was gorgeous, and she looked angry and happy and about five other things, and Bucky grinned. She'd been worried about Steve. He was going to have some questions for his boy later. "You're late," she said primly.
Steve pulled a broken radio out of his jacket pocket. "Couldn't call my ride," he told her with a small smile. That was the smoothest Bucky had ever seen him talk to a woman. He definitely needed to ask about this girl later. It was almost enough to distract him from what was obviously a bullet hole in the radio. Steve better not have had that in his pocket when it got hit.
Steve and the girl kept looking at each other, and Bucky could feel the crowd around them starting to break up. "Hey!" he called before anyone could get too far. He knew he was stepping on Steve's moment with the girl, but no way in hell were these guys getting away without giving Steve the appreciation he deserved for what he'd pulled off. "Let's hear it for Captain America!" He started clapping, and the crowd broke into a deafening roar of applause and cheers. Steve turned back to look at him, and he just cocked an eyebrow and smirked. He wasn't letting the Captain America thing go. And Steve didn't look mad. He was smiling—a little proud, a little embarrassed, and a little surprised that it was him people were cheering for. Bucky smiled back.
His face fell as Steve turned away and he swallowed down another wave of nausea. He blinked and there were two Steves for a minute before they blended back into one. A guy with a white coat and a stethoscope was touching his arm, and it took Bucky a minute to realize he was saying something. Yeah, he should probably go with this guy.
He clapped Steve on the shoulder and nodded toward the med tent to let him know where he was headed. He figured Steve had stuff to sort out with the Colonel, even if he had just dodged a court martial. Steve nodded and squeezed his shoulder. "I'll come find you," he promised. He nodded at the medic who was leading him away. "Take good care of him."
Bucky should have had some sort of snappy reply to that, but leaning on the medic and keeping pace with his feet was about all he could muster right now. Thankfully it wasn't far, and he found himself being deposited onto a bed in a little tent next to the big one. They were probably pretty full already.
The doctor came in, took one look at him and told him he'd be staying for a while. He nodded and leaned down to untie his boots, then the doc had to grab him before he face-planted on the floor. "Why don't we let Linda get those for you?" he asked, nodding to the nurse Bucky had failed to notice.
"Yeah, okay," he agreed, too tired to be embarrassed. The doctor pushed him back upright, and once he realized the doc was holding him up and the nurse was trying to take his shirt off, he tried to help. He wasn't sure if he did, and the next thing he knew, he was on his back on the mattress and the tent was spinning the same way the factory used to. His last conscious thought was that at least he couldn't fall over again since he was pretty sure he was already down.
It was too hot and it was too cold and everything hurt, but as long as he stayed unconscious, it didn't really bother him.
At some point, he became aware of his body again. He wasn't particularly excited about that. He felt like crap. He was sort of floating somewhere…somewhere…it was hard to tell. But there was someone there. "Nnh," he grunted, as whoever it was touched him. Barnes. Sergeant. Three, "…two, five-five…s'ven," he managed. That's what he was supposed to say when he was floating and there were people around, wasn't it?
Someone was talking and shaking his arm, and he might have opened his eyes. It wasn't like he could see anything, so it was kind of hard to tell. "Barnes. S'rg'nt. Three, two…five 'ive, sev'n…"
He felt his head moving and something hit him in the face. "Barnes," he rasped. He didn't want them to start hitting him again. "Sergean'…" It didn't make them happy when that was all he said, though. "Three. Two…" Why couldn't he stop saying it? "Five…" No wait, he knew this. How did the rest of it go? "Three, two, five…five…s'v'n…" What was next? Oh, yeah…"Barnes…"
Someone was talking to him. Zola talked too much.
"Sergeant…" he whispered. There were…there were numbers after that…
"Please, Bucky," a familiar voice begged. Bucky. That was him. And that voice…"Don't do this." He knew that voice. That voice was scared and he didn't like for that voice to be scared. "It's me, it's Steve. I'm right here. Please come back."
Steve. That was Steve and Steve was scared. Don't be scared, Stevie, I'm coming. "Steve?" he croaked, and he blinked, and blinked again, and, okay, there he was. He was blurry, but there was Steve.
Steve laughed and that was good, that was better than Steve being scared. "Bucky!" He sounded so happy to see him. "Hey, yeah, yeah, it's me."
Bucky blinked again and licked his lips. His throat felt really dry. He could see a little better now, though. Steve was still there. Steve was really big. That's right, Steve was big now. That was a…that was a thing. It was all green behind him. Not the lab, so that was good. "'s goin' on?"
Steve couldn't stop smiling. Bucky didn't know why, but it was nice to have somebody so happy to see him. "You're in the medical tent. Back at camp." Oh, right. Right. They walked…they walked a long way. "You got real sick," Steve added, his smile fading. "Doc said you have pneumonia."
Well, that probably explained a few things. "'s what M'rita said." Morita had thought he was coming down with pneumonia, and the way he felt now was the same as he had felt in the cage, so he was probably right.
"What?" Steve asked, and now he looked worried again.
It took an awful lot of work, but Bucky rolled his eyes. No, Stevie, I'm not seeing things. "'n th' cage," he explained. "Was sick then. Morita thought it was 'monia." Wow, talking was hard.
"Oh," Steve said. "Well, he was right. But they're gonna get you fixed up. You're gonna be okay."
Something about Steve's face when he said that…"Y'alright?"
"Me?" Steve seemed surprised he would ask. Bucky wished he had the strength to roll his eyes again. "Yeah, I'm fine."
"Look like hell," Bucky told him. He didn't look hurt, but it was hard to tell under all the dirt. He didn't smell awesome either, but, fortunately, Bucky had nothing left to throw up at the moment.
"Nothing a shower won't fix," he assured him. Bucky eyed him suspiciously. "Hey, go back to sleep, alright?" Steve said, patting his shoulder. His eyes were closing without his permission. "Everything's okay now."
"Mm," was all that Bucky could manage. He wasn't sure if everything was okay. There was something…something from the lab Steve needed to know about…
He thought he'd been asleep—and it had been such a long time since he'd actually gotten to sleep—but then very abruptly he was awake again and Zola was there, looming over him. There were more straps on the table, holding him down, and he couldn't move at all. Something was tied down over his mouth, almost choking him. Zola smiled.
"Welcome back, Sergeant," he leered. "You didn't think you actually got away, did you? Let's get back to work, shall we?" Lights blazed into life above his face, blinding him. Zola appeared above him, blocking part of the light, with a syringe in one hand and a blade in the other.
The needle sank into his skin and his blood was on fire. He screamed, but no sound came out. The machine was humming above him, and the snakes were rolling in his gut, and his eyes widened in revulsion as he looked down and saw the skin of his stomach rippling as they writhed inside him.
"Oh, no, the poor things," Zola said, not sounding sad at all. "They appear to be trapped. Let's help them out, shall we?"
Bucky screamed in pain as Zola's blade slashed across his stomach, then screamed in horror as the snakes came climbing up and spilling out, slithering out of his stomach and off the side of the table, hitting the floor with wet, bloody smacks. Zola laughed gleefully, snatching up one of the snakes and slicing its head off with his blade. "Cut off one head," he cackled. "Two more shall take its place." And Bucky screamed again as two new heads popped up out of the wound.
The snakes were wriggling along in his veins now, even as they continued to pour out of his stomach, more burst through the skin of his chest, his arms, his legs. Everywhere they came out, the skin tore and peeled away in strips, leaving bright red flesh stretched tight across his bones. The skin was falling from his face now, leaving nothing but a bright, red skull, and he couldn't scream because the snakes were in his throat now, they were in his mouth and he couldn't breathe and—
"Bucky, it's okay." The voice was far away, but it was gentle and familiar and safe. "It's okay, you need to breathe. Just slow, deep breaths. Deep breaths, like me." He didn't understand any of the words, but they were calm and they were home, and he let them take his hand and untangle it from his hair. His eyes followed it as it moved, and it rested on something flat and broad and moving slow, and he knew this. He knew this. He used to do this a lot, and he knew what he was supposed to do, and it took him a minute to remember how, but he pulled in a long, deep breath.
"There you go." And he understood the voice this time. He was doing it right. Okay. Okay, he could do it again. "There you go. Just breathe. It's okay. It was just a dream." One more. That was breathing. He was doing it.
Breathing wasn't as hard as it was a minute ago. He wasn't quite sure he was doing it right, but it was getting better. The voice sounded happy. The voice was…The voice was over there. He moved his fingers slowly, feeling the bunch of soft material as he curled them. The voice was real. The voice was…"Steve?"
"Yeah." And a large, warm hand was reaching up and grabbing his. "Yeah, I'm here, Buck, it's okay."
Steve was here. Steve was…He wasn't…Bucky's eyes rolled around the room. It wasn't the lab. "Wh…Where…" It hurt to talk.
"We're in an Army hospital," Steve answered, and it had to be Steve, knowing what he'd been trying to say like that. "Remember, we left the factory? Had a hell of a long walk back here." Yeah, okay, Bucky did remember that. His eyes went down to the pinch he felt in his arm and his hand followed it. They weren't—Steve wouldn't let them…"That's just medicine," Steve assured him. "You've got pneumonia, and that's just regular old antibiotics." He sounded like he was waiting for something, and Bucky pulled his hand away from the needle. That's right, he was sick. He remembered that. Steve wouldn't let them put anything bad in him.
He nodded. "Right. Right, you, sorry, you said that before, it—I didn't—I'm sorry." Words still kind of hurt, and they weren't coming out in the order he wanted them too. Why did his head hurt so much? Oh, right, he was sick.
"It's okay," Steve told him with a sad smile.
No, it wasn't. It wasn't okay. Bucky scrubbed his hands down his face and sighed. He could still feel it. Whatever Zola had put in him, whatever it was that made his stomach churn and felt like shards of hot glass flowing in his blood, that was still there. "I thought for a minute..." he sighed, pressing his hands to his mouth. He'd thought maybe he was back, and he knew now he wasn't, but it didn't matter. Because it was still inside him.
He swallowed down a surge of nausea and opened his eyes, looking up a Steve who was blurry through his unshed tears. "They did something to me, Stevie," he said softly, his voice tight in his throat. "In the lab, they…They put something inside me." A lot of something. Something bad. "I can still…" He swallowed again as the snakes started churning faster. "I can still feel it. I can feel it in me—" It was moving and cutting and dancing inside of him but he didn't know what it was doing. Was it changing him? "—and it's wrong." It was so wrong. "—and I don't know what they did and I don't know what it's doing, and…" His voice broke and he ran out of words, and the tears that had been swimming in his eyes finally spilled out and started to fall, but he didn't care because whatever they did to him, he was broken now and he didn't know how not to fall apart. "Steve, I'm scared," he whispered.
Before the words had made it all the way out of his throat, Steve was reaching out with large, warm arms, pulling Bucky into an embrace so tight it hurt, but it was the safest Bucky had ever felt. He started crying in earnest now, shaking uncontrollably, and Steve just held on and let him. "It's gonna be okay, Buck," Steve said softly, and his voice didn't sound exactly steady either. "We'll figure this out. We'll figure this out and everything will be fine. I promise."
"You can't promise that," Bucky whispered. There was no one he'd rather have in his corner, but some things even Steve couldn't do. He didn't know what they'd done.
Steve's arms pulled in even tighter around him. "Just you watch me," he growled, and that was Little Steve in a back alley, bleeding and bouncing up off the ground to declare he could do this all day.
Bucky tried to laugh—because if there was one person besides Giant Steve he'd want in his corner, it was Little Steve—but it came out as a sob and more tears, and he clenched his fist in Steve's shirt to ground himself and try to keep from floating away in an ocean of terror, because it didn't matter which Steve he had, he didn't see how they were getting out of this one.
"We'll fix it, Buck. We will," Steve insisted. "I talked to the doc already, and whatever it is in your blood, they know it's there and they're working on it. And if they can't fix it, then we'll figure it out. You and me." And, somehow, the more Steve said it, the more Bucky believed it. Bucky always believed Steve, and whatever this thing was, Steve would die before leaving him to fight it on his own.
He couldn't manage words just yet, but Bucky nodded. "I promise," Steve said again softly, and Bucky believed that too.
It took him a little while before he was able to rein his tears in. Bucky hated letting anybody see when he was weak, but Steve…Well, Steve had always been different. He was safe. And while Bucky certainly didn't enjoy crying in front of him, he didn't really mind either. Steve never saw it as weak, never made Bucky feel bad about it. So he took the time to let the tears run out, let the fear run its course. He took comfort in Steve's presence, the arms around him, shielding him, the hand in his hair, Steve's head resting on his…So safe and solid and so very much there. He was real and he was here, and so was Bucky, and if they were together, they could lick anything. Just like they always did.
When his voice was steady and his fears, at least for now, were locked up in the back of his mind, Bucky took a deep breath. It wasn't like he'd never hugged Steve before, but now that his thoughts were settling, he was starting to process how weird this was. Usually he was the big one. "You're huge," he couldn't stop himself from saying.
Steve's chest shook with surprised laughter, and Bucky pushed away to sit up. Yep, Steve was definitely massive. He knew that. His brain had accepted it, and yet, somehow, not. He knew it but it still surprised him. "That's still a thing, huh?"
Steve smiled at him. "Yeah. Is that okay?" he asked, and for the second time in as many days he was ten years old again and waiting for Bucky's approval.
It hurt his throat, but Bucky laughed anyway. "What, because you'd change back if I said no?" He shook his head. The punk was ridiculous. "It's okay, Steve." And, yeah, it really was. "It's weird as hell, and I still maintain that it was stupid, but, yeah, it's okay."
Steve's smile returned. "It is weird," he agreed, and Bucky wondered for the first time just how weird it had been for Steve. Had he run into things because he was so tall now? Tripped over those giant feet? "And, yeah," he continued. "It was probably stupid—"
"No, no," Bucky interrupted. Yes, he was accepting this now, but that didn't mean it hadn't been a colossally bad idea. "It was definitely stupid. But, you're okay, you came out of it fine, and…" He trailed off. Steve had always been so much bigger on the inside, so much more than anyone ever saw. "It just…It kinda fits you, you know?"
"What?"
Bucky waved a hand that was clumsier than he would have liked. "You were always this guy," he explained. "The brave little idiot staring danger in the face because you thought it was the right thing to do." He smiled fondly. "The outside just matches the inside now."
Steve turned several shades of red in rapid succession, but Bucky could tell he was pleased by what he'd just said. He went to say something else, but broke out into a sudden, rather painful cough.
Steve was already moving and suddenly there was a glass of water in front of his face. Bucky drank it eagerly, forcing himself to drink slowly so he didn't throw it all back up, and enjoying the coolness soothing his raw throat.
Steve took the empty glass and sat it down, reaching behind Bucky to plump up the pillows on the bed. He put his hands on his shoulders and pushed him back onto them. Bucky protested briefly—more out of habit than anything else. It did feel nice not to have to be holding himself up, but still being able to breathe at the same time.
"Better?" Steve asked.
Bucky nodded. "So, pneumonia, huh?" He didn't think he'd ever had it before. He knew Steve had. A lot. "You're the expert, how long does that take to go away?"
Steve smiled. "It usually took me a couple of weeks." Bucky thought he remembered that. Steve was sick a lot, though, so it did all kind of blur together. "You could probably be out of there by the end of the week, though," Steve allowed. "You're still in better shape than I ever was when I had it."
"You can't be serious," Bucky said, shaking his head. Yeah, Steve had been a sickly, scrawny little stick of nothing, but he'd never been POW-bad…Had he? Steve shrugged, and Bucky realized that, yeah, he probably had. At least some of the time. If this was pneumonia, how had that little shrimp survived having it eight times? "How are you even still alive?" he wondered.
Steve smiled, looking at Bucky fondly. "I don't know," he replied. "I think it had something to do with this big jerk who was always looking out for me. He used to threaten to thump me if I didn't get better."
Bucky couldn't help but laugh at that. He supposed his bedside manner had, at times, gotten a little brusque. He sobered. There had been a while there where he'd never thought he'd get to hear the little punk tease him again. "Hey, Steve?" he said. "I should've said it before, but…thanks."
"For what?" He looked genuinely confused.
"For what?" Bucky repeated with a sigh. He couldn't be that dense, could he? "For saving my life, moron." He reached over and smacked his leg with much less force than he was used to. "What'd you think I meant?"
Steve went red again. "Oh, well, I…I mean, it's just, you know…" Bucky smiled fondly. Steve had never really known what to do with compliments. "I mean, anybody would've…"
Bucky rolled his eyes. In Steve's head, yeah, everyone should be that brave and noble and ready to do the right thing. He smiled and waited until Steve was looking at him. "You stormed a weapons factory thirty miles behind enemy lines, alone,"—and they would talk about that later—"saved four hundred people, punched some sort of…Nazi hell-beast in the face and got everyone home safely. It's not what anyone would have done. And nobody did it," he added softly, smile fading. He'd known they were too far in, too well-surrounded. Nobody planned to come for any of them, and Bucky should have died in that hellhole. "Nobody but you. Thank you."
A soft smile grew on Steve's face, and he reached over and squeezed Bucky's arm. "You're welcome," he said softly.